Monday, December 26, 2011

it looks like lulu might pick a fight with the next person that wanders by! i've painted ten faces on these cards now and they've all been a joy, even feisty lulu...

on december 19th the sun shown in my art room windows illuminating it entirely. the same thing happened yesterday as the sun was in the same position it was in before the solstice. i know, i know, the sun's not actually moving, it's the earth - but it certainly looks like it's the sun! i love to watch the movement of the sun, especially at this time of year...

the wall behind my chair - that red thing is a blanket on the back of my chair...

i snapped a lot of pics, ha! this is what was on the table. it's a 7" x 9" sennelier journal that this lovely person gave to me. i'm really enjoying working on a bigger page... and i'm getting close to finishing another pocket moleskine, and still painting on the cards. i like the diversity of it all...

i don't have a link to the sennelier journal - i'm not sure if they are available online. i've just discoveredstillman and birn journals, though, which seem very promising. click on 'paper specifications' (top right on the home page) to quickly see what kinds of papers are used in their journals.

Thursday, December 15, 2011

rose ~ oil pastel, derwent drawing pencil, graphite on old paper

with faces like this i learn so much about the power of line; about darkening parts of the outline of the face, eyes, etc, to pull the eye here or there. in this case i used an 8B pencil for that. i love these pencils - i now have three of them! one for every spot where i might sit down and draw...

everything that i used for rose's face... the oil pastel is a cream caran d'ache neopastel.

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

this hexagon is one of the many things that have come from my exploration of hexagons/honeycomb, which started here. at the time i had no idea that synchronicity would present me with so many opportunities to learn more about them! one of the latest things i read is that some scientists feel that it's the frequency (i.e. resonance) of the hexagonal shape that calls bees back to the hive - it's what they hone in on. i don't seek these things out - they just pop up out of (seemingly) nowhere! before this all started i'd never thought about the fact that there is a star tetrahedron inside a hexagon...

in case you're wondering what i'm using for a template for these cards, it's a card from the rumi tarot deck. it's about 2 3/4" x 4 1/2". the artwork is by nigel jackson, and there are a lot of great images in the deck.

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to answer questions about technique or materials... please feel free to ask here or email me. i work primarily in books using watercolors, gouache, pastels (soft and oil), graphite and colored pencils. i also love to work on muslin and plaster cloth, and when i'm out walking i draw on sticks, stones, and rusty stuff...